Yuck it Up

“Bono is playing a U2 concert in Ireland when he asks the audience for quiet.

     Then in the silence, he starts to slowly clap his hands, once every few seconds.

     Holding the audience in total silence, he says into the microphone, “Every time I clap my hands, a child in Africa dies.”

A voice from near the front of the crowd pierces the silence…

     ‘Fookin’ stop doing it then’!”

     Bono, the founder and lead vocalist of the rock band U2, is known not only for his musical prowess, but also as someone who uses his celebrity to further the cause of justice for those on the margins of society. I reference the story above not to applaud Bono’s sensitivity and efforts on behalf of those who suffer from hunger, homelessness, the ravages of war, and self-serving politics, but to highlight the importance of humor as we confront the very real and tragic social concerns of our times.

     I hope you found the “fookin’ stop doing it then” comment as funny as I did when I first read it. The audience member’s implication that the death of African children is caused by Bono’s clapping was surely meant to lighten the serious tone that had been set. It may seem insensitive to inject humor into a reality as tragic as children dying, but without it, the weight of life’s injustices could easily overwhelm us.

     Perhaps this awareness is what moved the author of the Hebrew scripture’s Book of Ecclesiastes to state that there is a time for every purpose under heaven; or mythologist Joseph Campbell to claim, “There is a time for Buddhist meditation and a time for Irish whiskey!” In any case the world is something of a mess, and we must find our way through it as nimbly as possible. If humor helps, then it is surely good to give ourselves permission to yuck it up now and then and to have a fookin’ good time when we can!